Real estate General topic

[paulsharvey]

On my way to work, stopped and checked mail. Got a mailed notice of oweing $800 of misfigured taxes on the old house. Was pissed, not so much about the money, which does annoy me, but the fact that I had called 5 times, and left 3 messages, and also sent 2 emails; asking closing company to clarify how they wanted it handled. So, I emailed them Again, and explained that.

After about 30 minutes, they responded, with first, please provide details on dates of those messages because we need to handle an internal problem, and 2nd, now all of the sudden, they would be happy to assist in getting the money to buyer, with receipts and all, if I would deliver a check to their office, payable to the buyer.

So, thats what I did.

 

[ultrarunner]

I’m becoming a little soured on Title Companies…

I am retiring a mortgage and Title Company is Trustee…

In the past these things were all handled at any branch office…

New policy is reconveyence is now only done by reconveyence department and all original documents must be sent… no in person drop off…

 

[ericm979]

Wow the California paperwork for selling a home has become insane. The disclosure documents are huge. About 50 pages of stuff. Lots of boilerplate that's probably good background info for first time buyers but not really needed for us. The state checklist for wildfire related home features was written so poorly that we had to ask the realtor for clarification. A bunch of docs had both state and county versions that we had to read and sign. Of course being nerds who take everything literally we had to read and understand it all.

The worst thing is the offer/counter offer process. I'm used to counters being single page documents that just say what you want changed in the initial contract. Now it's the complete initial contract which you sign and initial again, plus that single page.

 

[ultrarunner]

Yep… buried in paper in the digital age.

My residential rental agreements were a single page with a second page inventory and condition…

Now over 30 pages with all the mandatory disclosures and city and state mandates…

I’m trying to retire a mortgage and the lender can’t come up with the original Note…

Always something…

 

[LouNY]

Ridiculous bureaucratic over reach at it's finest.

 

[WinterDeere]

Ridiculous bureaucratic over reach at it's finest.

... says the guy from NY to the guy from CA.

 

[Mi-Troll]

Generally, all agents are going to get roughly the same % of the sale price, and the difference is speed of sale, both for them making money, and for your decision of who to use.

That's what I considered, dump the house for a quick sale for their commission and bragging rights on the number of homes they sold.

 

[Mi-Troll]

We had issues getting comps, because as our mortage company pointed out, crossing a county line totally changes things. Different taxes, schools, stigmas, ect. Our northern property line Is the county line. They really had to go like 30 mile radius, and like 6 month sales history to gather what we're at best, so-so comps. As in, one home was like 18 years old, some where 5 acres, some 12 acres, one had a perm carport, non had pools, ect. The closer, time, distance, and residence the more reliable the comp is.

With that, any mortage is going to want to see they arent loaning above value, so comps are needed regardless.

Edit: 30 mile radius isnt really accurate; upto 30 miles east, south, and south east, as im in the far north west corner; if it wasnt for that, they likely could have gotten more, and easier comps

A lender will not loan above the value, but where does the value of the property come from when it's time to list the house, from what an agent that thinks your property is worth, from the state's assessed value or would one be best off by paying for an appraisal before contacting an agent?

 

[Mi-Troll]

Have you ever tried looking at your house at Zillow.com

I'm not promoting their assessment tool but it might just give another perspective as I believe it is really only based upon the type of house you have, # of SqFt, age, # of bed/bathrooms,.... Its comparing all this data to other houses in your nearby area that have sold recently.

Now if your house is a post and beam style and there are no other post/beam style houses, Zillow isn't going to work for you. If however you live in a development and generally the houses are similar in age and construction, what's really going to matter is the square footage, number of bedrooms, number of bathrooms, garage size. The next thing that's going to come into play is your interior finishes, did you just spend $80 to renovate your kitchen, your primary bathroom, did you just finish your basement... A realtor is going to be able to customize your house price for those things.

I have looked at Zillow many times and compared the houses on my street which were all built within a year of each other and of similar size with the exception of mine. My house is about 1000 sqft to 1500 sqft larger and is the second largest house on the street, Zillow's listing of the price per square foot is drastically different, about a $70 per square foot delta.

My house is $40 per square floor less than my next-door neighbor's house for near identical looking houses, my garage is larger as well as the number of bedrooms, etc.

I noticed that all of the houses were similar in size but with a delta in price and without Zillow knowing the detailed differences between them, Zillow is using some sort of Min-Max pricing with a mean value for houses on this one street, regardless of the size. I noticed that the one house that is larger than mine, is priced per square foot lower than any other house on the street, putting it at the max value for the street, not by much and twice the size.

Using the average per sq ft value of the other houses would put the one large house at nearly double the price of every house on the street, except mine. In the end, it means that if this person sold their house, the buyer would be getting a great deal, a much larger house with the price based on smaller homes on the street.

 

[WinterDeere]

...where does the value of the property come from when it's time to list the house, from what an agent that thinks your property is worth, from the state's assessed value or would one be best off by paying for an appraisal before contacting an agent?

The value comes from the offer you're willing to accept. You'll see all sorts of asking prices, both too high and too low. But when a buyer comes along with an offer, and the seller accepts the offer, that's the value of the property!

... and because I just know someone is going to ask: When asking price is too low, there are often multiple offers, from which the highest or most attractive becomes the accepted value.